Lena Mai joined the Junior Research Team “Private Debt and Property Formation in the Context of Historical Upheavals in Germany and the USA” in April 2025. In this subproject, her work examines and compares experiences of change and credit-financed ownership in the US during the Great Depression in the first half of the 1930s and the Great Recession of 2007-2009. She is particularly interested in the affective dimensions at play in these historical contexts, at the private as well as the state and media level. With a degree in American Studies from the University of Leipzig, she has long been interested in the cultural implications of historical events and the insights they provide into contemporary cultural and social challenges and the lived realities of people at different points in history. Her research interests include the intersections of (queer) identity, affect theory, consumption, and cultural narratives in (popular) media, both in historical and contemporary contexts, particularly from the end of the 19th century to the present day.
